Heretofore, it has been very difficult to obtain a picture in which brightness between a person and a nighttime background is well-balanced in a case where the person or the like that is a main subject is photographed with a nighttime background with emission of flash light.
As described in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2000-66087, and Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2000-307941, there exists a technique in which image capture with emission of flash light and image capture without emission of flash light are continuously performed in a case where a person is photographed in a nighttime background by use of a digital camera, and two images are combined after the image capture to generate a captured image in the nighttime background.
However, in the above-described conventional technique, when an exposure period is lengthened in order to obtain a satisfactory captured image with respect to a nighttime background portion, camera shake and the like are easily caused, and it is difficult to obtain the satisfactory captured image. When the exposure period is shortened in order to reduce the effects of the hand shake and the like, and an amplification factor of image data output from a solid-state image sensor is raised, the image is easily affected by noise such as thermal noise. Even in this case, it is difficult to obtain the satisfactory captured image.